Posted on 21 Mar 2011 . 12 comments
April 9th from 9:00am-Noon
This annual event is a major fund raising initiative for the Germantown Avenue Crisis Ministry and you don’t have to walk to participate. We’ve set a goal of $6,000 and need you to help us meet the challenge.
First, pick up a Contribution form and begin obtaining names of those who will provide cash donations to the cause. Additional information to connect you to our team web page will be available soon making it easy to donate on line and to invite friends near and far to support us too.
Second, plan to join us for the 5K walk/run (a little over 3 miles) beginning at the Art Museum and proceeding around Martin Luther King Drive.
Read More
Posted on 14 Mar 2011
Comment off
Revealing Deeper Layers of Meaning in our Building
If you go to the Richard Smith Memorial Gateway in Fairmount Park, you will find two curving, neobaroque arches adorned with thirteen individual portrait sculptures, two eagles astride globes, and architectural reliefs of eight allegorical figures.
James Hamilton Windrim (1840-1919) is the subject of one of the busts; he faces forward and looks off to the left. Windrim was the architect for this church. He also designed Philadelphia’s Masonic Temple, the Girard Building at 12th and Market Streets and several of the buildings on the campus of Girard College; he had been a member of the first graduating class of the college.
Windrim’s design for First Presbyterian was Gothic Revival of a length of 137 feet and an extreme width of 88 feet. The apex of the roof rises 66 feet from the ground, and the spire is 150 feet. Alterations to the building over the years, however, have changed the dimensions of the structure but not the intent of it as a house of God and a place to worship God “in the beauty of holiness.”
Read More
Posted on 07 Mar 2011 . 1 comment
By Rev. Kevin Porter
When I first came to FPCG in 1994, the name of the newsletter was Crossroads News. The name was taken from our congregation’s motto, “The Church at the Crossroads,” emphasizing our place prominently at the center of Germantown, both physically and as a community partner working for the neighborhood’s well being.
As Windows takes on a new look this month, we’re launching a new regular feature in which I’ll highlight the ways in which FPCG is indeed “The Church at the Crossroads” now more than ever through the community partnerships in which we’re actively involved.
Although I’ll be focusing on the ways in which we’re an “at the table” institutionally, I am also interested in letting readers know how our members are bearing witness to their Christian faith through their work in the community.
If you have a story to share, please let me know so that others will see how the body of Christ is at work transforming Germantown.
Posted on 28 Feb 2011
Comment off
Reflections by Rev. Nancy Muth
I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? Isaiah 43:19a
Dear Friends,
Change is not always easy or a welcome thing, but it is often necessary. Some unfortunate but necessary changes have been made at The First Presbyterian Church in Germantown due to our current financial situation.
Our church has been blessed by having an endowment that was made possible from gifts given by former members and friends of the congregation decades ago. The monies were wisely invested and grew over time. For more than ten years now we have been relying heavily upon the endowment to fund our church’s ministry and mission. In fact, we have been relying so heavily on these monies that the endowment has been decreasing in value.
Read more
Posted on 27 Feb 2011 . 3 comments
On Sunday, February 13 over 100 people were in FPCG’s sanctuary to participate in the initial community gathering of a new organization, Neighborhood Partners to End Gun Violence (NPEG).
This interfaith effort consists of congregations throughout northwest Philadelphia affiliated with the larger church-based anti-gun violence initiative Heeding God’s Call.” Bryan Miller, one of the founders of Heeding God’s Call, preached at FPCG last year to highlight the need for churches to bear witness to our call as peacemakers through direct action. The Session of FPCG resolved for the congregation to support these efforts.
Our subsequent role as a founding congregation of NPEG and the rally are the latest manifestations of our commitment. As of this writing, Rev. Porter and FPCG members are scheduled to be among those picketing a gun shop in northeast Philadelphia that has refused to sign a code of conduct that would greatly reduce the sale of guns purchased for illegal re-sale on the black market.
Contact Rev. Porter for more information. Read more about our involvement in this important initiative.
Page 9 of 22 pages « First < 7 8 9 10 11 > Last »
